Ugh. That month of December and beginning of January is going to make the end of this season painful. CBJ obviously still have a chance to get into the playoffs, but right now no one is doing them favors. All the teams bunched up in the 7-12 spots just keep winning. Think about this: If we even play .500 between the god awful stretch between Dec 1 and Jan 14, this isn't even a discussion. We'd be sitting in the 3 or 4 spot in the West. I know law of averages and all that, but this team as it sits now is competitive. Figure over the last 20, we need 26 points. Needless to say, our season could literally come down to the meeting @Nashville on April 8th. Darth Vader, on the road, in a place we haven't won at in 16 games. Gonna be fun!

"All Beckett needs to do to cap off this mess is order some fried chicken and beer" – 5/10/12 before Beckett got chased in the 3rd at Fenway.

It's in my column to run tonight, though I stole it from Portzline. He said right now the projected total to get in the playoffs from the West is 96-97 points. So, CBJ would need to go 14-6 over their last 20 AND hope that there aren't a lot of three-point games.

Tall order. Doable if they take advantage of the games in hand. Those are 5 brutally hard games in April though, especially if BUF needs to win that final game to get in.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

That was easily one of their bottom 2 performances in the last 3 years. Not much to say other than that. Win or lose, I still see Calvert turning into something great. That move he did to get out of the corner was ridiculous and the deke he put on in the 2nd to get Umby an open looks was slick.

"All Beckett needs to do to cap off this mess is order some fried chicken and beer" – 5/10/12 before Beckett got chased in the 3rd at Fenway.

Govbarney wrote:After Masons shit proformance, I would expect to see Garon as the keeper tonight.

Tonight is close to a must win, a tough task when your in Calgery.

Go right back to Mason. His last two games after being pulled were a 34-save shutout against Detroit and a 3-2 win over Detroit.

I know Mason gave up two bad goals last night, but Arniel pulled him to try and light a fire under the team. It didn't work. Sometimes it serves as a wake up call, especially with the way that Mason's played since mid-January.

Mason's your guy. You give him that vote of confidence again.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

RickNashEquilibrium wrote:That was easily one of their bottom 2 performances in the last 3 years. Not much to say other than that. Win or lose, I still see Calvert turning into something great. That move he did to get out of the corner was ridiculous and the deke he put on in the 2nd to get Umby an open looks was slick.

Let's see what Calvert does tonight against a historically physical Calgary team. The Oilers team plays with pillows tied to their chests.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

As Umby put it, "kid plays like he's 6'3" in the corners." I'm with ya, though. Cal-gary is a gigantic team with speed. Gotta get back to playing the north south game. No idea what led to all the turnovers last night other than laziness but the bleeding has to stop. Won't say its a must win, but losing to another team in the race is digging the hole too deep.

"All Beckett needs to do to cap off this mess is order some fried chicken and beer" – 5/10/12 before Beckett got chased in the 3rd at Fenway.

Historically, Columbus plays Edmonton's game when they play them. You can't do that. You have to play the opposite of Edmonton's game to beat them. Trying to play a speedy transition game with EDM is futile because they're better at it than you. They're not a good team, but they have tons of speed and no puck possession. If you keep the puck away from them, they cannot hurt you. Columbus doesn't really have the big bodies to do that, so EDM is a tough matchup for them.

And, last night's game showed what the loss of Stralman will do. Their only real puck movers on D are Russell and Clitsome, and Clitsome is going to make mistakes, hence the -2.

Calgary's a bad matchup because they're undersized against them. But, CHI played a speed game on them and got 5 goals on Kiprusoff the other night, and Kipper's been dynamite lately.

I might be off a little with my math cause I hastily put this together, but when Rick Nash fails to register a point, the team is 6-16-2. He's gone the last three games without a point and they're 0-2-1.

Every game's big from now on, but these four point games are even bigger. Especially with the two or three games in hand on the other bubble teams.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

+1,000,000 on that EDM take. On my previous post, I didn't mean to imply they should play North/South transition against EDM. That take was for the Calgary game. I digress. CBJ has the problem of not dictating the action against lesser opponents quite frequently and its cost them. I don't get it.

As for tonight, keep the backcheck strong and try to force turnovers/breakouts in the defensive zone.

"All Beckett needs to do to cap off this mess is order some fried chicken and beer" – 5/10/12 before Beckett got chased in the 3rd at Fenway.

RickNashEquilibrium wrote:As Umby put it, "kid plays like he's 6'3" in the corners." I'm with ya, though. Cal-gary is a gigantic team with speed. Gotta get back to playing the north south game. No idea what led to all the turnovers last night other than laziness but the bleeding has to stop. Won't say its a must win, but losing to another team in the race is digging the hole too deep.

Il tell you what led to it , When the Oilers scored on a cross-ice feed that led to a virtual empty net goal, minuits after Upshaws goal was taken away. That swing took the CBJ way off their game, and they were never really able to get momentum back after that .

"I don't think they're building chemical weapons in Berea. But they might be. I can't say for sure."Chuck Klosterman

Frustrating loss; but if you look at the rest of the season as a whole, its par for the course, Jackets are a very streaky team. Got to learn how to win in Canada if they ever want to be competitive in the West.

"I don't think they're building chemical weapons in Berea. But they might be. I can't say for sure."Chuck Klosterman

All five losses are one goal games on the road (EDM game included an empty netter). This is what happens to teams without depth. You have a Jackets team that has three guys who can score goals: Nash, Calvert, Umberger. Just look at today's practice lines. Derek MacKenzie is on Nash's line. I like him a lot, but he's an energy guy. Not a distributor to a 40-goal scorer.

When you can't get the right matchup as a team without depth, you have a tough go of it. The Flyers have a better road record than home record. Why? Because they're the deepest team in the conference. Detroit and Vancouver, the two deepest teams in the West, have the best road records.

You cannot be too reliant on one or two players. The Jackets always have been. This is the result. You lose 5 in a row on the road in March.

The trade deadline is the opportunity to acquire depth. While I like the trade, they didn't answer Stralman's injury. 20 PP's in the last 5 and they're 3/20. No PP QB. They also didn't answer Brassard's injury. Now, when he gets back, it's probably too late.

Govbarney wrote:I hate shootouts. Its like deciding a baseball game with a home run derby. I wish they would just play 4 on 4 for 5 min then end the game in a tie.

I also hate the shootout. If they want to keep it, they need to elaborate the point system. 3 for a regulation win, 2 for an OT win, 1 for OTL/SOL. Make incentives for winning the game in regulation rather than playing for OT.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe